March 2010 Grocery Challenge

hermum

Hi, of the 6 people how many are kids & how old are they? Will the £300 include lunches for school or do they have free school meals? The nightmare to feed, what do they eat?

calleyw

I think that dropping from £450 to £300 is too big a drop in one go.

Try a £50 drop.

Also before you go shopping again look at everything you have in the fridge/freezer and cupboards and see what you can make before buying more by planning for a week of meals to start with.

There will be others will move advice soon.

All the best.

Yours

Calley

becky170

I'm defintely going to go over budget this month, as I only have £7 left of it and I've got a tesco shop being delivered on monday which is around the £25 mark. For some reason I didn't really twigg that it was a 5 week month this time so really I should have bugdeted a bit etc, or at least not spent £7 in superdrug on stuff which could have waited. In fact I've not done very well on saving money full stop this month

jintyb

Hi everyone, just popped on to update sig and review my spends! So far Im over on my year to date by @ £50 so I'll need to curb it a bit over the next wee while. Maybe I'm being unrealistic about the price of things so rather thanconstantly beating myself up about going over I'm going to set my budgets a tiny bit higher, then if I'm under then its a bonus!
My April starts today(Payday) so Im going for £210 this time.Its a five-weeker this time too. Should be ok as I've got loads in!
This month's mantra: I WILL stick to my list I WILL I WILL I WILL!!!

thriftlady_2

I spend quite a bit more than £450 a month for 5 people. It is possible to whittle it down though but cutting it by a third will be hard if you do it all in one go.

Three ways to keep costs down are to eat less meat, to eat up what you already have in your cupboards before you buy any more and to plan your meals so that you only buy what you need. When I do these things i can save a lot. I don't always do it though.

Penelope_Penguin

uolypool wrote: »

Hi I've currently been spending in the region of £450 a month on groceries :eek: that is for 6 ppl. I have decided that the time has now come to reduce that dramatically as money is tight (x oh gave his job up just so he doesn't have to pay child support ) I cook mainly from scratch ,have 1child who is a nightmare to feed says he doesn't like anything but everyone else eats a wide range of foods.Do you think that reducing it to £300 is possible this does include washing powder and things like that and basic toiletries

I'd advise taking a look at the Grocery Challenge There are lots of people there who'll give you good advice and support to reduce your spend to an affordable level.

I'll merge this thread later.

Penny. x

dreamingofmoney

Haven't had time yet to catch up on the last couple of pages, but really need to ponder my spending activities. I am dangerously close to going over budget already and still have 12 days to go, i stupidly reduced by budget this month from 300 to 250 (why i have no blooming idea) it has been mothers day, a big birthday for me etc etc. And i have just blown it. And i'm not sure what to do, i have not been in this situation before in a year of money saving (have sailed very close on a few occassions) and i don't know what to do to get myself out of it. Also how to stop myself falling into same trap next month.
Please please help, i am very desperate, i do have loads in freezer and could feed us but it is mostly junk, so wouldn't be benefitting us really, maybe do a pizza and salad etc etc.
I am half thinking about packing in altogether as i feel so much pressure (from myself, noone else, DH thinks the changes i have made already are fab) but i just want to be debt free but then real life gets in the way.
Sorry to moan but didn't know anywhere else where people would (hopefully) understand where i'm coming from:o
Dreamer

BigMummaF

Ooh..just tried to post & got a weird thing about a missing token..how strange!

Anyhoo! I wanted to say--Don't Fret Dreaming; we all get difficult times & that's why this is called the Challenge If you can, have a think about where this month has gone wrong & where you could do things differently to help prevent it happening again--seem to spend most of my time doing that As for what you have in your freezer, give us an idea of what you have & I just know someone will come up with a creative recipe to turn fish fingers into Thai lemongrass pollack on roasted spaghetti hoops :rotfl:

ellas9602

Hello Dreamingofmoney

I understand how you feel. I sometimes feel immense pressure but only from myself, my head just swims with trying to make it all fit.
If you've never been in the position before you've done incredibly well and must be organised and hard working so dont beat yourself up.
Try to stay positive, I felt this way last week, had very little food in and no money but with some thought sausages became a healthy(ish) casserole, old cabbage became low fat coleslaw..etc etc.
Why dont you list what you have and we can help to come up with a plan to get you through. Serving something a bit junky with something healthy makes it not so bad:p I always find that making a list helps transfer the pressure from my brain to the paper and can make the negativity go away. Dont be so hard on yourself :A. x x x x

jintyb

dreamingofmoney wrote: »

Haven't had time yet to catch up on the last couple of pages, but really need to ponder my spending activities. I am dangerously close to going over budget already and still have 12 days to go, i stupidly reduced by budget this month from 300 to 250 (why i have no blooming idea) it has been mothers day, a big birthday for me etc etc. And i have just blown it. And i'm not sure what to do, i have not been in this situation before in a year of money saving (have sailed very close on a few occassions) and i don't know what to do to get myself out of it. Also how to stop myself falling into same trap next month.
Please please help, i am very desperate, i do have loads in freezer and could feed us but it is mostly junk, so wouldn't be benefitting us really, maybe do a pizza and salad etc etc.
I am half thinking about packing in altogether as i feel so much pressure (from myself, noone else, DH thinks the changes i have made already are fab) but i just want to be debt free but then real life gets in the way.
Sorry to moan but didn't know anywhere else where people would (hopefully) understand where i'm coming from:o
Dreamer

Hi there, believe me, we all totally understand how you feel! That's why we're all here! I was feeling just like you today, (see my post its the one before yours.) I dont think I was being very realistic with my budget. I realised there's no use making it so tight that every spend is a worry, cos the GC ends up taking over every waking moment and that's not what it's about! I also decided to stop constantly buying whoops/reduced stuff unless it is something on my list or TOO good to pass up.
I think we are all guilty of putting ourselves under pressure, but all the little changes we're making soon add up!
Before I started on th GC, I was on the chuck diet - chuck it in the trolley, chuck some in the cooker - chuck most of it away at the end of the week. Now, thanks to this, I think carefully about what I need to get and I've totally rejigged the way I shop and cook.
Last night for example, I made a brill pasta dish with fridge bits -leftover spinach, ham, mushrooms, garlic and a bit of mascapone. Only a short time ago, I would have been putting things like that in the bin. Today I made a chicken pasta salad for lunch with leftover chook and bacon I had in the freezer. I feel really chuffed with myself and you should too by the sounds of things Remember Rome wasnt built in a day!
Sorry for the ramble - hope this helps a bit:A